by Heide Goody
Another microphone shot forward, this one attached to an older man with a serious expression. “Was this your plan all along to get a stake in the legitimate religion business through your app business?”
“Um, might have been,” said Clovenhoof, who couldn’t honestly say he’d ever go in for ‘plans’ as such.
“Are you the Uber of the faith world?” called another.
“I’ve no idea what that means,” he replied, “but you can put it in your papers. Now, let’s get back to my amazing church, shall we? It will set the standard for changes that I’m putting in place in every local church, however small. Free Wi-Fi as standard, comfortable seating available in the premium areas. A coffee shop with all of the standard pointless variations on a cup of coffee, and a few new ones that I have invented myself. There will be samples of the Chocco Dongo available for those of you brave enough to try. We will have free screenings of all major sporting events and ‘Fish and Chip Fridays’ will be kicking things off as our first themed catering campaign. Questions?”
“Can worshippers expect any significant changes?”
“One of my advisors will be tasked with updating day to day operations, including services. We’ll keep the parts that people like. Our work with focus groups suggests that Christmas carols should stay, for example, but we’ll need to cut out the dullness. You can expect to see new-style weddings and christenings coming soon.”
“Will you be appointing a new Archbishop?” said the blonde woman.
“Ah, very pleased that you asked,” said Clovenhoof. “Step forward Nerys Thomas, who from this moment is the new Archbishop of Birmingham.”
Nerys sashayed forward pouting and blowing kisses to the crowd. “Hello Birmingham!” she shouted, smiling widely and turning to each of the photographers in turn. “I want you to know that I’m thrilled to be your new archbishop, and I can’t wait to get stuck in to the role.”
“It’s great to see a woman in the role. What issues interest you, Nerys?” shouted a voice from the back.
“The whole thing needs an overhaul,” said Nerys. “Seriously, have you seen the clothes? I want to start with a uniform that works for me, as a woman.”
“Right on, sister, smash the patriarchy!” came the voice from the back and an excited babble arose.
“As you can see,” said Clovenhoof, “construction is underway already on my new church and it should be ready for you all to visit very soon. We’re setting the pace of change for the Church of Hooflandia, and you need to keep up!”
Rutspud made two cups of tea and put one on the kitchen table by Felix’s hand. The human had been working on modifying the app for several days and making few comments on what he was doing, apart from a little sub-vocal muttering about chunks of code. Rutspud was a tech-savvy demon, he understood computers, but watching Felix at work was like the greatest Victorian surgeon watching a geneticist unfold the human genome.
“What are you thinking?” said Rutspud, sipping his wonderfully scalding-hot drink. “You’re making a modification, yeah?”
Felix nodded. “Barely any at all. It’s just a question of what we do with the input data, where we store it, where we send it. We can literally turn the tables on all of these people and their secret sinning.”
Rutspud saw a gap in understanding opening up. Not so much a gap, as a chasm that would surely create some difficult explaining later on. “You know, when Joan talked about fixing things, I think she meant that you should just turn it off.”
“Yeah, yeah,” said Felix with a dismissive flap of his hand. “Your friend is all about damage limitation.” He turned to Rutspud with a broad smile. “Whereas you, I suspect, are all for making things more interesting. Am I right?”
Rutspud couldn’t fault his assessment. “Well yes, that does sound like me.” He shunted his chair forward to see better. “What is it that you can do to make it more interesting then?”
“There’s a log of every sin that’s been forgiven by the app, and which user committed each sin,” said Felix. “It seems to me that it’s time everyone was accountable for their actions. I’m setting a countdown clock for ten days from now, and when the time is up, I’m going to broadcast all of that data.”
“You’re planning to expose everyone’s sins for the world to see?” Rutspud asked.
“Yup,” said Felix. “Broadcast through the app, the app’s social media pages and in a text file dump to news agency servers.”
“Wow,” said Rutspud.
Felix typed for a few moments and then hit the enter button with a flourish. “Done. A message is going out right now to all users to tell them what’s going to happen.”
Rutspud thought about the implications.
“PrayPal has just gone from being a super hip, best-selling app to being the most shitty and vindictive gossip on the planet.”
“Yes, it has,” said Felix with a cheesy grin on his face and picked up his cup of tea.
“And what’s that going to do with your company stock value, huh?”
Felix shrugged. The cheesy grin wasn’t going anywhere.
“You think I was ever in this for the money?”
Rutspud stared at him for a long second. He raised his mug and clinked it against the young programmer’s.
“Here’s to being poor but happy.”
“I’m sorry, Okra,” said Nerys, turning to admire herself in a full-length mirror while world-renowned designer Winnebago Kiss Kiss pinned her robes into a snugger more curvaceous fit. “I just don’t have time for that kind of relationship. Archbishopping is a demanding gig and my church comes first. Now, if you want to see me, you can come to the opening service at the Church of Hooflandia.”
She killed the call and sighed heavily.
“You know,” said Ben from the games table where he was busy making notes and consulting his laptop, “for a man who barely speaks, that Okra sure opens up when you try to dump him.”
“I’m just going to have to block his number.” She looked down at the crouching designer. “When the robes of office are done, I want bikini, monokini, catsuit and thigh-length leather boots to co-ordinate.”
Winnebago mumbled something muffled by the pins between her lips.
“That’s right,” said Nerys. “This archbishop is never going to be seen in the same outfit twice.” The phone rang again. “If that’s him, I’m going to hire a hitman.”
“I’ll do it for free if you ask nicely,” said President Clovenhoof, slouching in his throne.
Nerys put the phone to her ear. “Call for you,” she said to Clovenhoof and tossed him the phone.
“Hoof me!” he yelled into the receiver.
“Oh Jeremy,” wailed the caller. “I need to level with you.”
“Alice? Is that you?”
“I’m so sorry,” said Alice Calhoun, “but when you didn’t come round for so long I decided to find someone else to be my gigoloafer. I’ve been seeing other men, Jeremy.” There was the sound of her blowing her nose while Clovenhoof pondered this. “If it’s any consolation, none of them were a patch on you,” she added.
“It’s all right Alice. I should have made time for you. What made you call today?” asked Clovenhoof.
“Everyone’s owning up to things,” she said, sniffling, “since their secrets are coming out anyway. I heard everyone else being honest and I just couldn’t live with myself anymore.”
“Listen, I’ll see you soon Alice,” he said. “Farting on my own isn’t as much fun anyway.”
Clovenhoof ended the call, bounced to his hoofs and strode out to the balcony to admire the erection of his new church. It was amazing how quickly steel girders, pre-fab concrete slabs and a shitload of plasterboard could be raised up into a facsimile of a grand and ancient building.
“Confessions! People are making confessions,” he said, savouring the words.
“Seven days until the sin list is made public,” said Ben, looking up from his computer. “Twitter is on fire with it, peo
ple tweeting their guilty secrets in a pre-emptive strike before the broadcast of PrayPal’s sins.”
“Numerous hashtags are trending,” said Nerys, “like #comingclean, #confession and #mybad. We’re seeing press releases from every C-lister you’ve never heard of.”
“And should we be doing something about that?” said Clovenhoof.
“We’ve got the PR team working to reinforce our message that this is the work of a rogue programmer. Winkstein has helped by vanishing into thin air,” said Nerys.
“I mean, should we be taking advantage of this sudden guilt-a-thon?” said Clovenhoof. “Can we monetise confession?”
“I’m not sure how,” said Nerys.
“You see the problem with this book,” said Ben, looking up from the mass of notes on the table, “is that there are so many rules and edicts that I’m sure there must be something we could use but I don’t know where to find it.”
“What book?” said Clovenhoof.
Ben held up a weighty copy of the King James Bible.
“No, Ben,” said Nerys, “we don’t want to know what the Good Book says.”
“We don’t?”
“No, we want it to say what we want it to say.”
“What? Do a rewrite?”
“What it needs to say,” put in Clovenhoof, “is that Hooflandia is the centre of the bloody universe. That this church –” He pointed out the window at his magnificent burgeoning erection “– is the centre of the bloody universe.”
“And I’m the rightful archbishop,” added Nerys. “Like it was my destiny or something.”
“Okay, okay,” nodded Ben, jotting down some notes. “I mean this is music to my ears because the inconsistencies were driving me nuts. Get this. Here in Chronicles there are one point one million fighting men in Israel. Then here, in Samuel, there are only eight hundred thousand fighting men. At the same battle! Ridiculous!”
“Typos creep into books all the time,” said Nerys.
“Not when it’s meant to be the word of God! There’s so much that needs fixing.”
“Ooh,” said Nerys, wagging a finger and nearly ripping her robes out of the dress designer’s hands. “Can you put more female characters in the new version?”
“You want more women in the rewritten version of the Bible?”
“More speaking roles,” said Nerys and the pin-lipped dress designer mumbled in wordless agreement.
“And it has to pass the Bechdel test,” she added. “At least two named female characters who get to talk to each other about something other than men.”
“The virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene,” said Clovenhoof helpfully.
“Right. Beef up their parts. Maybe change one of their names so people don’t get them mixed up. And they can’t just be talking about Jesus. I want them going off and having their own adventures.”
“Sort of a spin-off gospel?” said Ben.
“Right. Except it’s not a spin-off. It’s totally central. Doing their thing.”
“There was a Gospel of Mary,” said Clovenhoof.
“Are you going to go all Da Vinci Code on us now?” said Nerys.
“No, it’s true. There’s lots of books that didn’t make it into the Bible. You think the Church Fathers didn’t pick and choose what they wanted?”
“I’ll look them up,” said Ben, bending with enthusiasm to his new task.
“Sure thing, off you go,” said Clovenhoof. “Now, back to me. What’s the media saying about my wonderful new church, Nerys?”
“Well, the headlines are –”
“In a Yorkshire accent, Nerys, please.”
Nerys gave him a look. “You’ll need to find a different employee to humiliate like that, someone who’s prepared to abandon all dignity.”
“Did I mention that Hermès had been in touch?” asked Clovenhoof airily. “Something about someone of my status bypassing the waiting list for their new limited-edition handbag.”
“By ‘eck, tha’s mebbe onta summat there, Jeremy,” said Nerys, contorting her face to get the vowels out. “Let’s ‘ave a look at t’eadlines, shall we pet?”
“Is pet Yorkshire?” asked Ben. “Surely it’s more Geordie.”
Nerys had already gone red in the face as she concentrated on her mangled accent, and she turned to Ben in fury. “If you’re such an expert, you do it!”
“But I don’t want a Hermès handbag,” said Ben primly, fixated on his work.
“It’s fine Nerys, you can stop the accent. I want to be able to understand what you’re saying,” said Clovenhoof.
“Fine,” huffed Nerys. “Well the PrayPal news is taking up a lot of space. Everyone’s gearing up for a massive banquet of sordid tidbits. The tabloids are all bringing out an extended special edition with the top thousand celebrity sins listed.”
“Cool,” said Clovenhoof, “although someone’s got to read through all of those broadcast sins. That’s a lot of reading.”
“So, there’s quite a few pieces that talk about crunching the numbers. They go on a lot about Big Data and artificial intelligence and yadda yadda maths stuff, but the main thing is that they seem confident that they can dish the celebrity dirt in time for the morning edition. There will be a Sunday special analysis of who’s done what as well.”
“Think about how we can use this when we open the doors of our church,” said Clovenhoof. “The big screens should have a scrolling feed with all the latest updates. A multimedia sermon should be a lot of fun.”
CHAPTER FIFTY
Joan was stuffing the last of her belongings into her rucksack when Rutspud knocked on her door.
“Ready?”
She shouldered the pack. “I guess so. I need to say goodbye to Felix.”
“He’s already gone,” said Rutspud. “But I suspect you’ll see him again before I do.”
“Really?”
“If there’s any true justice in the cosmos.”
She shook her head and sighed.
“Hey, why so glum?” he said.
“I’ll be glad when I’m back in the Celestial City.”
“Won’t we all.”
“I mean…” She wasn’t sure what she meant and she didn’t continue until they were on the landing and had locked up. “This journey has just made me feel soiled. The world was a crazy mess when we arrived but it’s an even crazier mess now.”
“We’ve corrected the sin imbalance. The wicked have been exposed for what they are. There’s a renewed interest in faith all across this country. What’s not to like?”
She clumped unhappily down the stairs.
“Yes, there’s certainly a new air of piety but it’s not…”
“Not what?”
Sister Anne and Tommy Chuckles were waiting in the hallway downstairs.
“Are you checking out now?” said Tommy with a cheery eye-roll.
Both Sister Anne and Tommy Chuckles were dressed in sack cloth. Well, Sister Anne was dressed in actual sack cloth. Tommy was wearing a brown pillow case with a hole cut out for his head. They both had ashes smeared on their foreheads.
“Yes,” said Joan. “You both look very… penitent.”
“It is a time of spiritual cleansing, child,” said Tommy. “All must repent and renew their relationship with God. We must wipe the filth from our minds and from our streets.”
“That’s nice,” said Rutspud.
“Sister Anne and the others are going to the Hooflandian church for devotional worship. You can join us if you wish.” There was, for the first time ever, a sinister tone to Tommy’s little voice, a suggestion that those who did not join might have their names written down at some point – written down and remembered.
“That is unbelievably kind,” said Joan with a false smile plastered on her face, “but Rutspud and I must be moving on. We have a, um, higher calling.”
“Or lower,” said Rutspud and sidled past the holy sister. The puppet’s gaze followed them to the door.
“God be with you,” said Joan i
n farewell.
“Oh, he is,” said Tommy Chuckles. “He is.”
“See?” said Joan, when they were a safe distance down the road. “Part of me is very pleased that Sister Anne has found a fresh sense of piety but it’s still a bit…”
“Creepy as fuck horror movie, Bible basher piety?” suggested Rutspud.
“In not so many vulgar words, yes. God’s love is warm.”
“Like the fires of Hell?”
“And although his love is fierce and challenging and sometimes frightening –”
“Like the fires of Hell.”
“– it is open to all.”
“Like the fires of Hell.”
She tutted and gave an exasperated arm shake that rattled her armour. “Let’s go home. What do we have to do? We just find a church, hook up into those spiritual desire lines your lot have hacked and get Belphegor to bring us back?”
“Exactly,” said Rutspud. “We’ll have you home before you know it.”
Finding a church that was open was not as easy as planned. In the rioting of the previous days, some had been sacked so thoroughly that they were now boarded up, too dangerous to enter. Others were simply locked up, no longer in use, like the Roman Catholic church next to the Sutton Park pub. The statue of the Madonna still leaned precariously out of the window, looking up the road as though she might be calling the boy Jesus in for dinner.
Joan considered the distance from the ground to the broken window.
“Give me a leg up,” said Joan.
Rutspud gave her a look and she compared their relative sizes.
“Fine,” she said. “When you get inside, go round and unlock the door.”
“And how am I expected to get – wooah! Woah! Put me down!” Joan tossed the smaller demon up. He latched onto the head of the Virgin Mary and wrapped his limbs around it in a most unseemly manner. He gave her a vicious glare. “Those gauntlets are cold, lady! Like your heart!”
He scrambled round and jogged down the length of the statue into the church. Ten seconds later there was click at the door and Joan was able to go in.
